Pitching for more women in the armed forces, Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on Monday that her ministry is working day and night to open up the defence sector for women.
“Women are keen to join the armed forces. This is a voice that I am hearing very often nowadays and in various different places. We are very open-minded about having women come into the services. The decisions, of course, will have to wait because several of them who were in short service commission have gone to the courts asking for permanent commission. These cases are in different courts,” Sitharaman said.
According to figures provided by the ministry of defence in Parliament, the Indian Army has 1,561 women officers till date, with maximum number, 292, in the Army Ordnance Corps, followed by Army Service Corps and Engineering Corps, respectively. In 2016, the Army figure was 1,512 women officers, while in 2015, strength of women officers in the Army was 1,468.
“Each of these services have taken their own approach towards getting women a limited option of getting into their force and, as a result, there is no parity within the three services either. Like the Indian Air Force has opened it up for women to be fighter pilots and that is absolutely the front-end and top-notch level to which women can reach, whereas in Army, women are still not up for many of the positions except for the Medical Corps.”
“In Navy, they are gender-neutral but of course, women cannot go into the sea and therefore there are different approaches that are prevailing. I am spending quite sometime with all the three forces to make sure that we take a synchronised position and also approach the court to handle all these cases, which are already there about short service commission women being offered permanent commission,” she added.
The Indian Air Force has already given combat roles to its women officers, with Avani Chaturvedi becoming the first woman officer to fly a MiG-21 Bison solo and two of her colleagues, Bhawana Kanth and Mohana Singh, are following her.
In fact, in the IAF, a number of women pilots have proven themselves, flying helicopters and transport aircraft in high-risk rescue and other missions. Some women pilots have also flown sorties on AN-32 aircraft to the Advanced Landing Ground at Daulat Beg Oldie (DBO) in Ladakh. DBO, the world's highest landing ground at 16,500 feet, is close to the Line of Actual Control with China and is a critical supply line to troops posted at the Siachen Glacier.
However, the Indian Navy, which has 469 women officers in the service, is yet to allow women on warships. In 2015, only 382 women officers were in the Navy. But in November last year, the Navy broke the glass ceiling by deploying 70 women officers, whom it calls combat aviators on the Navy's most sophisticated anti-submarine warfare aircraft, the US-built Poseidon 8-India (P-8I) and IL-38s used to detect warships and submarines in the Indian Ocean.
Shubhangi Swaroop became the first pilot of maritime reconnaissance aircraft and three other women cadets, Astha Segal, Roopa A. and Sakthi Maya S., had also created history by becoming the country's first women officers at the Naval Armament Inspectorate (NAI) branch of the Navy.
In recent remarks, Navy Chief Admiral Sunil Lanba claimed that future warships are being modified with 'suitable facilities' to accommodate women crews on board.
Sitharaman was speaking at an interactive session “Stories that matter—journey of India’s First Full Time Defence Minister” organised by the FICCI Ladies Organisation (FLO), the women's business wing of the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce & Industry (FICCI).
“We are also taking steps to ease entry of women-led start-ups and provide leverage that gives them equal opportunities, so that they can participate in tendering processes to allow them to enter the defence supply space in various selectors including logistics,” Sitharaman said.